Meeting Roddy Doyle

It's always nice when you can get work and your own interests together in the same room, and it didn't come any better than this afternoon, when the long-awaited 'One Author, One Community' initiative finally came to fruition in Navan, and Roddy Doyle sailed into our midst for a totally spellbound two-hour visit.

We had chosen to read and work on one of his lesser known novels, 'Mad Weekend,' written in 2006, the year after Liverpool had won the European silverware (after a dramatic match: first half - no score, second half, score 3 - 0... remember...?). Anyhoo, the plot of this novella, saw three 20 something Dub male mates organise to go to a match in Liverpool on the night they are watching the European final. When they eventually get to Liverpool, they spend a great deal of time in The Beehive pub chatting up girls and losing one of their number - as well as seeing a Chelsea v Liverpool match... and the rest - well, you'd have to read it :)

Featuring Roddy's trademark snappy Dub (and Liverpudlian) dialogue, all the groups of learners involved really got into appreciating Roddy's work in the lead-up to today: some wrote him letters, some wrote him reviews, and some thought up some fiendishly difficult questions, which Roddy answered with generosity and aplomb - heck, even panache.

Well, he won a definite fan in me - not that that was ever in doubt. I still fondly remember going to see The Committments in Camden Town in London, back in 1991 with my mates and feeling very proud of being Irish afterwards, even we were all eejits. I was so proud today to see how well everyone acquitted themselves - and I think I won a few fans over to the cause of reading and writing - not bad for a few weeks work :)

Word up: Roddy's own favourite book is actually The Snapper; he told us a great story about how he was in the Rotunda, waiting for his own wife to give birth, and while there the camera crew turned up to film the pregnant girl arriving to the hospital - talk about life imitating art.

Excellent day - deadly buzz man!

More Lovely Poetry Books...

... being launched in Dublin on Tuesday 8th December @ 6.30pm at the Unitarian Church, St. Stephens Green, by Director of Poetry Ireland, Joseph Woods. This is a lovely venue for a launch, as you get to read your work from a pulpit and the acoustics are very good in poetry terms. Plus, there are interesting stain-glass windows to gaze at as you hear the words.

The books in question? Well, Arlen Houseare are launching five books; Red Riding Hood's Dilemma, by Orfhlaith Foyle, Shedding Skin, by James Martyn, imram/odyssey by Celia De Freine, An Urgency of Stars, by Geraldine Mills and The Truth in Mustard, by Terry McDonagh.

All interesting titles, I think you'd agree. I can't go myself, because I must teach... but I shall be looking forward to ogling the books and getting inside the covers before too long :)


Good luck to them all on the night - maybe you might fit this line-up in :)

Michelle's Peony Favourite Poetry Books 2009

Michelle of Peony Moon has a great series running just now: writers with their favourite books of 2009.

Part 5 includes my choices, but not my whys... more on this rumination later. As you can guess, I was hard pushed to actually nail three, never mind six - there are so many great poetry books out there.

If you were stuck for a Christmas present for someone who likes poetry, and wanted to get them something out of the usual for Christmas, you could do a lot worse than browse these lists and google the results. It just shows you there's some mighty fine poetry out there...

Nude Launch Afters

Sorry I wasn't back here sooner, I was a little, um, busy this last two days.

Anyhow, Nuala's launch for Nude went very well indeed: quite a crowd turned out in the delightful No Grants Gallery for the night and many copies were sold - good job too. What great timing to have a nude exhibition, as a backdrop for the launch.

I collected my bag of copies for my creative writers and they can't wait to receive them tomorrow - they've been made wait a little longer than I first anticipated, so I'm glad to be delivering them.

Afraid I had to swing away early, I had an appointment with a large dose of preparatory lower-tummy medicine, and a toilet (and the least said about that the better - yuk!).

But I did manage to quickly swing by the Irish Writer's Centre to pick up a copy of the Davy Byrnes Six Stories shortlists and winners - and you gotta take your hat off to Claire Keegan - 'Foster', her winning story, is a pure blow-away. Feic me.

If you want to see pics, pop on over to Nuala's blog. My favourite is the one with all the chaps under the nude pictures ... :)

Dublin Nude Launch

I hope I have your attention now. I'm in Dublin tomorrow night for the launch of Nude, from Salt Publishing, by Nuala Ni Chonchuir (sorry about your fadas, N, this new version of Windows Internet Explorer won't let me copy and paste your name into Blogger, grrr! - give me Mozilla Firefox anytime!).

Where: No Grants Gallery, Temple Bar, Dublin 2

When: 6pm

Who: Nuala Ni Chonchuir

What: Nude

How: by any means possible!

So, you've been warned :)

PS. Did I mention I'm launching it..? Better go and write me speech now, hadn't I?

List Making

We are making lists here in Barbara-land. Ones that decide whether certain people have been naughty or nice, as well as ones that make fine promises about culinary standards that need to be addressed for the Yule season (whether to use Jamie's turkey treatment, or the stuffing as per the recipe on the back of the stuffing bag last year) - as well as outer rings of lists that orbit around the inner lists in a sort of black-hole-singularity kind of way (see, I've been reading the blogs tonight and paying attenshun).

So, I wondered: what goes on your lists for Christmas? Do you make lists of things that have to be done, or is it more a mental checklist (because you now know exactly what those lists should contain (besides socks and jocks))?

Do you worry about your lists; do you make a master-list of lists; and, more to the point, what happens when you start to list under the lists that you've made...?

Here's one thing that's going on my list: wasabi!

StAnza virtual poetry fest

Have a look at the post on Colin Will's blog about tomorrow, Saturday 14th's web festival of poetry, brought to you by the folks at StAnza.

They're beaming in live poetry from all over the world, from Mumbai, India to Sacramento, USA and everywhere in between, by satellite to St Andrews and then it's simultaneouly being webcast - so you can enjoy the action from the comfort of your own laptop.

StAnza website is here The festival kicks off at 1pm and finishes at around 10pm with live music etc to close. Remember this is a live stream; there won't be any catching up if you've missed anything, but you can tune in at any stage during the day.

Colin has the full line up in his post, mentioned above, along with poems, pics and translations. Do check out this exciting virtual poetry festival if you can, Saturday!